Suicide car bomb kills five, wounds 25 in Pakistan

A suicide car bomb targeting a police station on Thursday killed five people and wounded 25 others in a restive northwestern Pakistani town, police said.
A police officer and four civilians died in the attack in Doaba town in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, while part of the police station was demolished and at least 10 houses damaged, senior local police official Abdul Rashid said.
"The bomber, riding an explosive-packed car, blew himself up near a police station, killing five people and wounding 25 others," Rashid told AFP.
The bomber had been aiming to strike the building directly but failed to do so because of barricades that had been erected outside, he said.
"No one has so far claimed responsibility for the incident," Rashid said.
Another senior local police official, Muhammad Masood Khan Afridi, confirmed the attack and casualties in the town some 30 kilometres (18 miles) from Hangu district.
Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants attack daily across northwest Pakistan and the tribal belt on the Afghan border, which Washington has branded the most dangerous place on Earth.
They are engaged in a campaign of violence against security forces in the country, which is a key ally in the US-led "war on terror". The Taliban claim many attacks in revenge for US drone strikes in the rugged tribal areas.
More than 4,100 have died in suicide and bomb attacks across Pakistan since government forces launched an attack against militants in a mosque in Islamabad in 2007.
The United States wants Pakistan's army to do more to combat extremists on the border, including by launching a ground offensive in the district of North Waziristan, where it says key Taliban leaders reside.
The army has stalled on a ground operation, saying its troops are overstretched.
The Hangu area borders the deeply conservative tribal region of Kurram, a lawless region on the Afghan border where entrenched militants oppose jobs and education for women.